Paul Skenes Reacts to Pirates New Pitching Coach

Murphy worked with the likes of Luis García, Cristian Javier, Ryan Pressly, José Urquidy, Framber Valdez and Justin Verlander, all of whom excelled under his tutelage and earned many honors and awards.

He is also bilingual, speaking both English and Spanish, as he works well with the Latin American pitchers.

Paul Skenes Excited for New Pitching Coach Hire

Skenes, himself, is coming off an incredible season, which saw him finish as the National League Cy Young Award winner and post the lowest ERA in baseball (1.97).

He said after winning the Cy Young that spoke with Murphy twice, before he got the job and then afterwards and that Murphy wants to build a winning team in Pittsburgh.

"I talked to him before he took the job, and he's very sharp," Skenes said. "He's a very good pitching coach. There were other teams around the league that were coming for him, and I talked to him before he got the job and after he got the job, and I'll share what I told him, and what I believe is that there are two people that the Pittsburgh Pirates attract.

"I think we've had a little bit of both of them, but the first one is, ‘oh, well, they haven't made the playoffs in 10 years, it's a job in the major leagues I'll be able to build my resume here. I'll be able to get a contract here, whatever it is,' players, staff all the way through.

"I think there's that type of person, and that's not the type of person we need.

"The second type of person is the person that wants to build a winner in Pittsburgh, the person that understands the identity of the city, and understands how special it would be if we do create that winner.

"So I shared that with him. I don't know if he had job offers from other teams. I wasn't that involved in the hiring process, but in the second call, the thing that really stuck with me is that he told me that he's the second guy..."

Skenes also is impressed with Murphy's work as the Astros pitching coach and that he hopes he'll improve under Murphy's leadership, as well as the rest of the young Pirates pitching staff.

"...Words are cheap, talk is cheap. But he chose to come to Pittsburgh, and he could have gone elsewhere. So that's really exciting for me. Obviously he wouldn't have gotten the job if our organization leaders didn't think he was extremely sharp and very good at what he does.

"Everything I've heard is that he's really sharp and good at getting pitchers better. The work speaks for itself. Houston's been one of the best staffs in the league for as long as he's been there. So it's really exciting.

"Selfishly, I'm excited because he's going to help me get better. But with the young staff that we have, we've been craving coaching, we've been craving people to challenge us, whether the guys know it or not, and Bill's going to do that. So I'm very excited."